ICC convicts Mali rebel leader of war crimes – DW – 26.06.2024

The International Criminal Court (ICC) on Wednesday handed down a guilty verdict against Verdict in the case of an al-Qaeda-linked jihadist accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity during an alleged reign of terror in Mali.

Al Hassan Ag Abdoul Aziz Ag Mohamed Ag Mahmoud will be sentenced at a later date, but the crimes he is found guilty of could carry a life sentence. The charges against him include torture, rape and sexual slavery, as well as the destruction of religious and historical buildings.

The crimes are said to have taken place when al-Qaeda-linked insurgents, a group known as Ansar Dine, controlled the ancient city of Timbuktu in Mali for nearly a year in early 2012.

What was Al Hassan accused of?

Prosecutors accuse Al Hassan of personally overseeing amputations and floggings in Timbuktu during his tenure as police chief during Ansar Dine’s rule, leaving citizens of the historic city once dubbed the “Pearl of the Desert” living in fear of “despicable” violence.

Other charges against Al Hassan included overseeing the chopping off of hands. The then chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, spoke of one such case during the trial, describing the amputation of a man accused of petty theft.

“He was tied to a chair … and his hand was chopped off with a machete. A member of the armed group then raised his hand as a signal to the others,” Bensouda said.

Al Hassan is accused of particularly targeting women, Bensouda said.

“Many were forced into marriage,” she said in court. “They were imprisoned against their will and repeatedly raped by members of the armed group.”

Al Hassan was involved in organizing such marriages, the prosecutor told the judges. She quoted a rape victim as saying: “All that was left of me was a corpse.”

Prosecutors also accused Al Hassan of whipping women accused of adultery.

Mali under Islamist insurgents

Militants from al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and Ansar Dine took advantage of the Tuareg uprising in northern Mali in 2012 and took control of Malian cities such as Timbuktu.

They were ousted in 2013 by a French-led military operation, but the dent in their rule lasted much longer.

The fear and violence they experienced still haunt the residents. The rebels also destroyed some of Timbuktu’s symbolic shrines, which they considered to be idolatrous.

Mali has been embroiled in an Islamist insurgency for over a decade along with its neighbors Burkina Faso and Niger. The three West African countries recently came under the rule of military juntas following coups.

Al Hassan’s case is similar to that of Ahmad Al Faqi Al Mahdi, another Ansar Dine member who was sentenced by the International Criminal Court to nine years in prison in 2016 for destroying religious shrines in Timbuktu that are on the UNESCO World Heritage List. The sentence was reduced to two years on appeal in 2021.

rmt/sms (AFP, AP)